How does your puzzle-solving prowess stack up against other players? Can you crack the questions that leave most people stumped?
Although opportunities to answer this question with hard data are – disappointingly – rare in life, help is now available.
At Telegraph Puzzles , we recently teamed up with BBC Studios to launch The 1% Club as a daily game. As viewers of the popular television programme will know, this is a quiz with a twist.
There’s no use swotting up on trivia, as what you know is irrelevant. Instead, the questions test how you think, providing an entertaining way to exercise skills which are pretty useful in general life, such as logical and lateral thinking and creative problem-solving.
The questions get progressively harder as you play, allowing you to assess your level against the national average.
From “90%” questions, which nine out of ten people would answer correctly, you can advance all the way to “1%” questions, which just one sharp-witted soul in a hundred would solve. Conquer one of these questions and you can, with a due sense of satisfaction, consider yourself admitted to the elite 1% Club.
It’s not uncommon to hear that “only the brainiest people”, or those with “the highest IQs”, can solve the hardest puzzles.
In fact, the seemingly intuitive wizardry of the experts is often just familiarity with the techniques, tricks and patterns behind the questions. Here are a few of the simple skills needed to think like the 1 per cent and solve the most complex conundrums.
Word patterns
1% Club questions often ask us to think laterally about words. Instead of considering conventional meanings, the trick is to winkle out a sequence or connection hidden in the words themselves.
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Which of the following UK locations is the odd one out? A. Blackburn B. Greenwich C. Silverstone D. Ambleside E. Redcar
We can put our maps away, as geographical knowledge won’t help. Instead, by looking at what’s hidden in the words themselves, we can see that only Ambleside doesn’t begin with a colour (black, green, silver, red).
Have a go at this example . We’re easing our way in with a 70% question ( See answer below ).
Common-sense thinking
One device that puzzle-setters use to trap the unwary is sneaky phrasing or misdirection to hide obvious answers in plain sight. We may need to navigate our way through deliberately convoluted sentences or ignore irrelevant details to focus on the essentials. The key is to think with clarity and common sense.
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What number do you get if you multiply all the numbers on a phone keypad together?
Seeing the timer ticking towards zero, we might feel tempted to launch into frenzied calculations, but that’s falling for the trick. No multiplication is needed: one of the numbers on the keypad is zero, so the final answer must also be zero.
Can you see through the ruse here ? It’s a 35% question, so the questions are getting harder ( See answer below ).
Number sequences
Number sequences can seem impenetrable. However, we certainly won’t be asked to rely on our distant memories of the Fibonacci sequence or Mersenne primes. We’re looking for simple, everyday patterns appearing in a disguised form.
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What comes next in the following sequence? 369 121 518 212 427 303 336
The apparent difficulty is a trick of the spacing. Try it like this: 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 etc.
It’s just the three-times table, with the digits grouped in threes, so the final number must be 394 .
Here’s a 1% question . If you can solve it, congratulations, you’ve made it to the very top. ( See answer below )
To continue to challenge and hone your puzzle skills, and benchmark where you sit nationally, you can tackle more 1% Club questions via The Telegraph Puzzles here .
Answers:
Answer 1 : Bangladesh (LAD is hidden in BangLADesh)
Answer 2 : Few (Which has E and R added to make “fewer”)
Answer 3: 5 (The answers are 98, 76, 54, 32, so we need 10 as the last answer to give the sequence 9876543210)
Now we’ve given you the tips to tackle the toughest puzzles, see whether you can beat your friends and family by setting them a challenge to see who can reach the 1% Club.
Play The 1% Club free today on the The Telegraph Puzzles website or in the Puzzles section of your The Telegraph app .
